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Swansea City 0 Manchester City 4: Silva sparkles as Guardiola´s record-breakers march on

13 十二月 2017 22:40

Manchester City cruised past Swansea City 4-0 at the Liberty Stadium on Wednesday to set a new Premier League record of 15 consecutive wins.

Pep Guardiola's runaway league leaders set a new best mark for an individual season when they beat Manchester United 2-1 on Sunday and have now overtaken Arsenal's 14-game streak, which was registered across two campaigns.

Two goals from the irrepressible David Silva and one each from Kevin De Bruyne and Sergio Aguero sealed a routine triumph over the league's bottom club, maintaining City's enormous lead over United at the summit.

Silva, who grabbed the opener against United at the weekend, got City up and running after 27 minutes with a clever finish before De Bruyne continued his remarkable season by scoring with a free-kick.

Spain international Silva grabbed his second shortly after the restart with another fine finish and only some impressive saves from Lukasz Fabianksi prevented the scoreline from spiralling out of control.

13 - David Silva has been involved in 13 Premier League goals in 17 games this season (five goals, eight assists) – already more than in the whole of 2016-17 (11 goal involvements in 34 games). Service. pic.twitter.com/z6fwRlo6X3

Sergio Aguero completed another memorable night for Guardiola's record-breakers late on, finishing a mazy run with a wonderful finish into the bottom corner.

City, who made four changes from the game at Old Trafford, started in typically dominant fashion and came close early on when Fernandinho's sweetly struck volley was repelled by Fabianski.

The visitors were far from their fluid best in the opening quarter – with just two off-target Aguero headers to show for their efforts – but deservedly broke the deadlock shortly before the half-hour mark..

Bernardo Silva's teasing cross was inexplicably left by the Swans backline and his namesake, David, was on the receiving end to impudently flick past the exposed Fabianksi.

It took just seven more minutes for City to bag their second as De Bruyne's dipping free-kick from the corner of the penalty area bounced awkwardly in front of Fabianski and flashed past him into the net.

Silva should have scored his second immediately after the interval, but somehow contrived to skew wide after lovely interplay between De Bruyne and Aguero had released him inside the area.

Aguero was then denied by Fabianksi before Silva atoned for that earlier miss with a goal of the highest quality.

The 31-year-old collected Raheem Sterling's pass inside the area, moved the ball out of his feet, and clipped a wonderful finish over the onrushing Fabianski for his fifth goal of the season.

The horribly over-worked Swans goalkeeper made a fine save from Sterling just moments later and Aguero flashed wide as City threatened to run riot.

Aguero did finally get on the scoresheet with five minutes remaining as he blazed past the beleaguered Swans defence and stroked into the bottom corner - a fitting way to end a landmark evening for Guardiola's men.

Key Opta Stats:

- Manchester City have set a new outright record of 15 consecutive wins in the English top-flight. This is also an outright record within the top four tiers of English league football.
- Based on three points for a win, Manchester City have made the outright best start ever to an English top-flight season after 17 games (49 points).
- Manchester City have won the same number of games in this current winning run (15) as Swansea City have in their 55 Premier League matches since the start of last season.
- This Manchester City winning run (15 in a row) is still four wins away from Pep Guardiola’s best-ever winning run as a manager in league competition. He won 19 in a row between October 2013 and March 2014 as Bayern Munich boss in the Bundesliga.
- David Silva has been involved in 13 Premier League goals in 17 games this season (five goals, eight assists) – already more than in the whole of 2016-17 (11 goal involvements in 34 games).
- Sergio Aguero scored his 10th Premier League goal of the season – he has now reached double figures in all seven of his seasons as a Premier League player.